On August 29, an American drone killed ten people in Kabul, seven of them children, none of them terrorists. The man targeted was an employee of a humanitarian organization.

Making sense of partial information half the globe away from the scene is difficult, but there seem to be obvious weaknesses in the evaluation that led to this tragedy. There is little reason to believe that these weaknesses are not replicated in the targeting of other drone attacks.

The US military has been remarkably transparent about their investigation, although not all the intelligence has been released. Additionally, the military position is that this incident was regrettable, but they seem unwilling to publicly acknowledge that the weaknesses they’ve identified may exist in other drone missions.

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